The Bruce Froemming Love Society

An aside for a moment. What's with the sudden love affair with Bruce Froemming? Or as I like to call him, "that fat little pig". Is this all because he's retiring?

A few weeks back Joe Buck was kissing his ass on FOX and Froemming did so in return, talking about Buck's father Jack. The Yankee's broadcasters have been talking about him glowingly as well. This is the Froemming I remember.

Former pitcher/manager Larry Dierker:

"Bruce Froemming was an absolute terror at first - a cross between Napoleon and Hitler," Larry Dierker said. "(Especially if) it's a day game after a midsummer's night contest and he has to umpire behind the plate."

When Froemming was a rookie ump he cost the Cubs' Milt Pappas a perfect game. How? By refusing to call a strike. Pappas had a perfect game going against the Padres. He'd retired the 1st 26 hitters, when Larry Stahl came up. Pappas threw 4 sliders, all of which were in or around the strike zone. It turned into a 4 pitch walk and Pappas cursed out Froemming, who responded with an arrogant sneer. Then the little shit had the nerve the next day to ask Pappas for an autograph.

The latter part of that story is interesting, because it is taboo for the umps to get autographs. In 1996 Froemming went into the Dodger's locker room before a game seeking autographs, particularly Mike Piazza's. Piazza's teammate Tom Candiotti says it was even worse than that, stating that Froemming threatened to do to Piazza what he did to Johnny Bench when he refused to sign baseballs.

"I remember an incident with Froemming when I was with the Dodgers in 1996. Froemming came into our clubhouse about a half hour before a game I was pitching. He had some baseballs and asked Mike Piazza to autograph them. Piazza was on the table and the trainers were helping him stretch.

I'm getting ready to pitch -- I was about to go out and warm up -- and my catcher is trying to prepare for the game. And Froemming is telling Piazza this story about how one time Johnny Bench wouldn't sign baseballs for him, and Bench went 0-for-4 that day with three called strikeouts (or something like that). So Piazza stopped stretching and signed the baseballs. "

He stabbed his own brethren in the back. Froemming was one of the guys calling the shots when the umpires staged a mass resignation in 1999. Froemming criticized the umpires who didn't go along with the resignation, but later rescinded his and was re-hired by major league baseball. The majority of the umpires that resigned were never reinstated. (That piece of garbage Joe West was rehired too).

Froemming was to work an MLB series in Japan in 2003. The league was taking care of the flight arrangements. But Froemming decided to take care of his own itinerary. When Froemming was reprimanded he called umpiring administrator Cathy Davis, "a stupid Jew bitch.". That earned him a 10 day suspension and cost him the trip to Japan.

I for one will be glad when this piece of garbage is gone. He's never figured it out in his 36 years of service. No one comes to the game to see him.